Should advertisements carry warnings?

Randy Cohen, an editorial columnist for the New York Times Magazine writes a weekly piece called The Ethicist where he attempts to frame various news stories in an ethical perspective. He thinks some ads should come with warnings.

Before you take him too seriously, you might consider that most of his writing gigs in the past have been works of humor. Not ethics. One might even speculate the author doesn’t particularly take his own judgments with any certitude.

Still, the NYT is calling him “The Ethicist” and naturally therefore we’re subsequently obliged to give some weight to what Randy has to say on the topic of ethics. At least, until the publishers choose to give him a less academic-sounding title that, perhaps, is more reflective of his forte.

Originally, the hoi polloi got worked up in a dither after a graphic designer cooked up an advert for Ralph Lauren which featured an unnaturally distorted woman.

It should be readily apparent to most folks that this photograph has been manipulated beyond a point of believability. And it’s not a minor detail that’s easily missed, but the entire body of the model. Case closed.

It’s happened with other clothiers using famous models in their advertisements. Take Brad Pitt for example, whose mug was used in a hat trick for Edwin Jeans. Start with Brad’s face, superimpose it on the torso of a 20 year old guy, support it with the legs of a 14 year old girl and you end up with this hideously distorted image.

One might readily argue gender is the cause behind some distortions getting more attention than others. There’s certainly a correlation.

In his column, Randy Cohen breeches the topic by discussing how some women get upset over distorted images of women. In particular, he mentions a member of British Parliament who claims such photoshopping creates anxiety in women who feel they are constantly judged based on how they look. Additionally, he claims such photoshopping brainwashes men into a false understanding of what women look like.

He effectively believes such images are dangerous and damaging to women. Here begins the underpinnings of his argument that ads should come with disclaimers. It is the same underpinning behind arguments that photoshopped images should be banned entirely.

Poppycock!

We’ve idealized images of humans for longer than anyone can say with certainty. There’s nothing new under the sun.

Being judged on your looks? Photoshop didn’t start this trend. Becoming obsessed with your appearance because you believe you’re being judged on it? Photoshop didn’t cause that either. Biology and psychosis have a hand in this along with culture.

Hurting a few people’s self-esteem isn’t necessarily enough by itself to convince most of us to ban Photoshop, so The Ethicist goes in a little further in influencing our opinion on the topic by specifically calling out such distortion as fraudulent advertising which needs to be banned.

For us Americans, a ban on such ads might clash with our ideas about free expression, even when what’s expressed is that a particular mascara will lengthen your eyelashes, perhaps by as much as six inches, like twin fans glued to your eyelids, if I catch the implied promise. But we already accept labels that list a product’s ingredients or assess its nutritional value or warn of dangers in its use. Similar transparency should apply to phony-baloney advertising photographs.

Really? I fail to see where the materials of sweater might be harmful. I fail to see how the use of blue jeans is dangerous. It’s a load of emotionally-charged fear-based malarkey.

As if anticipating such a logical response to nonsense, David attempts to buttress the strength of his position by fine-tuning our understanding of how this photoshopping supposedly constitutes fraud.

It could also be argued that a labeling law, equitably applied, would require warnings on nearly all ads, including those that alter reality in other ways. For example, few roads are as serenely traffic-free as those in car commercials (and indeed some automobile ads on TV already note that they were photographed on a closed course). But here’s the distinction: Although that open road deliberately conveys a bogus sense of driving delight, the road itself is not the product. The car is the product. In fashion ads, however, whether for clothes or makeup or shampoo, the model’s beauty is the product, or at least the direct result the product is meant to achieve. Because that beauty cannot be obtained via the proffered merchandise but only through a tricked-out photo, this is a case of false advertising.

Here’s where the argument breaks down.

Clearly, driving delight is the “direct result the product is meant to achieve” in the case of the car, but you cannot obtain it because the roads in our daily life are not “serenely traffic-free” as shown and therefore — according to the naysayers — we should ban all ads which depict happy drivers in serene landscapes.

Meanwhile, it’s true the model’s beauty can convey an unrealistic sense of how much subjective physical attraction one can achieve, yet beauty itself is not the product any more than serenity was for the car ad. The clothes or makeup or shampoo is the product.

Either they both should be banned or cacophonous hecklers need to pipe down.

In this case, the rational conclusion is these ads present fantasies wherein real products are placed. But the fantasy is not the product. The product is the product.

Same as an athlete wearing Puma shoes won’t mean you can score as many goals as professional soccer (football) players do. At best, the purchaser of said shoes is simply trying to emulate something they like, respect, or covet.

Remember this ad from yesteryear?

Be Like Mike was a brilliant satire on this whole subject. While many adult and child fans of basketball may have been in awe of Michael Jordan’s abilities, clearly drinking Gatorade won’t enable you to “be like Mike” in terms of performance. Notice his grin at the end.

Tongue firmly in cheek.

Did you need a warning label on that commercial? How about the athletes who feel pressured to measure themselves against Mike, are they being harmed by Gatorade’s use of top athletes? Of course not. No one is selling athleticism.

They’re selling corn syrup. Now, that may very well be harmful.

But it’s not offending any ladies who define their worth based on physical appearance, so there’s no clamoring to outlaw Gatorade advertising. No one demands a warning label saying “Fattening junk in Gatorade will not improve your running speed.”

So, what should be done about these women with trim figures whose photos are further manipulated digitally to sell a TV show, hand lotion, or hamburgers? Well, at some point, it’s an issue of learning. Books, radio, and television were once seen by some as ostensibly The Truth. The brightest among us learned to discern between shades of gray, seeing things for what they were: the truth, the truthful, the fanciful, the deceitful, and the false.

If you were going on a date with someone you met online, no doubt you’d feel those manipulated photos were lies and you’d been sold a bill of goods. But that’s not what’s going on. Granted, Ralph Lauren, Edwin Jeans, and other companies are lulling you into a fantasy world by idealizing their products in one particular representation of beauty: the young and thin bodies of our sexual awakening.

Or an arguably gross distortion thereof.

But a real ethicist would conclude the advertisements were merely selling harmless pants. Not committing fraud. Then we could all go back to hating the people prettier than ourselves. Or accepting people in the real world as they are. Your choice.

Popularity: 8% [?]